Perhaps the most interesting aspect of The Fake Accents is their ability to make their inherent contradictions seamlessly coexist. One might not expect that the same band who records and listens to their own practice sessions would also write a disclaimer on their first album that most of the songs that they'd written were actually just ripped off of other songs. Their songs are identifiable by both their catchy hooks and their noisy guitar riffs.......

To say Stevie Wonder is a good artist would be an understatement. Over five decades, Wonder has amassed a catalog that not only includes over 30 albums but numerous songwriting and production credits. Fans in the District were treated last month to a two-and-a-half hour trip through a slew of rhythms and emotions. Wonder’s musical mastery has touched people worldwide, probably no two more than Brooklynites Bobbito Garcia and DJ Spinna. Both have made names......

What's That You Say? is our roundup of the best comments from last week's posts. So help us out and keep saying funny, interesting, and weird stuff. We know you can. ------ Speaking of weird, in regards to the manhole fire post, Jeffrey has this to say about the Cannibalistic Humanoid Underground Dwellers in our city: If I've said it once, I've said it thousand times: this city needs to launch a fire safety......

Travis Morrison Hellfighters play Thursday night at the Rock & Roll Hotel as part of a benefit show for Survivors and Advocates of Empowerment, with Ra Ra Rasputin and Jukebox the Ghost (***). 8:30 p.m., $10 in advance, $12 at the door. You can read our review of Morrison's latest album, All Y'all here What does the new album, All Y’all, mean to you? Well, it’s the first thing I did with this band. Travistan......

"The trouble with radicals,” goes a quote widely attributed to early 20th century economist Thomas Nixon Carver, “is that they only read radical literature, and the trouble with conservatives is that they don’t read anything.” That both sides of the political spectrum have proven that to be a lie will be apparent tomorrow tonight at the Trover Shop on Capitol Hill, which is hosting The Hill’s Sixth Annual Political Book Fair. Participating authors include current......

There's something inherently likable about about Spencer Krug. Just ask Wolf Parade bandmate Dan Boeckner who snidely referred to him as the guy that everybody likes. Although that was a clear barb, Boeckner has a point. Dante DeCaro, another fellow Wolf Parade member likes him enough to continue touring with Krug (under the moniker of opener Johnny & The Moon). Fellow Canadians Carey Mercer (Frog Eyes) and Dan Bejar (Destroyer) like him enough to work......

We were as surprised as anyone to discover we had never done a Three Stars feature on Georgie James. With a big, heralded entrance onto everyone's radar last year fueled by lots of live shows and an EP that won the hearts of pop lovers throughout the city, they became one of D.C.'s premiere bands. The band is driven by Laura Burhenn and John Davis (formerly of Q and Not U), doing their best take......

England's "Britpop" movement in the mid-1990s has proven to be one of the most enduring music trends of recent memory. Checking the local club listings will reveal all sorts of dance nights aligning themselves with "Cool Britannia," Creation Records and the like. Not many of the bands from that time are still together and making music though. The two stewards of the movement, Blur and Oasis, continue to release records now and then, although......

Dear Al Saunders: Please run the ball this year. Seriously, Al. In this, the Fourth Season of the Second Coming of Gibbs, you’ve got to run the ball! I realize that you got handed a crazy paycheck last year to be the steward of the offense, and on some level, I imagine that you had to go out there and prove you deserved it. After all, you didn’t want to be thought of the same......

When the advance promo single from The Beanstalk Library landed in our hands in the midst of that blinding heat wave in early August, it seemed perfectly timed. The one-two punch of “Elephantitis”, a rushing, gushing power-popper, and “Fake It”, with its requisite jangle and harmonies, was the perfect antidote to midsummer malaise. Now the proper full-length, America at Night, is finally out, and the band’s finally got the album they’ve been working on since......

DCist's highly subjective and hardly comprehensive guide to the most interesting movies playing around town in the coming week. Foreign: Ballad of a Soldier The AFI's great Janus Films retrospective continues, and there is probably no title on the schedule this writer is more eager to see on the big screen. Grigori Chukhrai's 1959 classic takes a simple concept — the tale of a Russian soldier making his way home to see his mother during......

At this weekend's Virgin Festival, we snagged a few spare moments with Spoon's songwriter and front man, Britt Daniel, and drummer Jim Eno. The Austin-based quartet has been one of indie rock's most beloved for more than a decade. They recently released their sixth album, Ga Ga Ga Ga Ga, to warm reviews pretty much everywhere (you can hear the whole album on their label's site here). After enjoying their set, I headed back......

Editor's Note: J. Tom Hnatow from These United States is writing a tour diary for DCist chronicling the band's latest national tour. July 30, 2007 We take scenic route 1 up to Portsmouth, NH, skipping the interstate entirely. When we tour, we try to take as much local scenery as possible, from small roads to food to art. In this increasingly homogenized world, we have to work to find the differences. It's sad to me......

By DCist contributor John Harlow Created and organized by artist and curator Mark Tribe, the Port Huron Project is a series of reenactments of protest speeches from the New Left movements of the 1960s and '70s, conducted at their original locations by paid performers. Previous PHP events have featured enactments of speeches originally delivered by Coretta Scott King and Howard Zinn in New York and Boston respectively. Tomorrow at 6 p.m., the National Mall will......

Ever wonder what it's like to be a band out on tour? And by "band out on tour" we don't mean U2 or even Scott Stapp. We mean bands that load in themselves, play their show and then get in the van and drive all night to the next gig. D.C.'s own These United States is such a band. Criss-crossing the country, playing upwards of 100 shows a year with bands like Califone, Someone Still......

The currency of "rocking out," once a rock and roll staple, has been severely undervalued in recent years. There was a time when throwing yourself wildly around a stage, suffering endorphin-masked injury, and smearing your bloodied body with peanut butter wasn't a particularly noteworthy night. That was just Topeka, and those wounds would magically heal themselves to be reopened again by the time you got to Omaha. Somewhere along the line rock went and......

What makes a champion? Is it commitment, the ability to spend the long hours necessary honing a skill to a razor's edge, forgoing the simple pleasures of idle laziness the rest of us take for granted? Is it drive, that fire in the belly that pushes a winner on, past discouragement, past early failures, past the point when lesser beings throw in the towel? Maybe it's simply birthright, taking advantage of those innate abilities that......

Amy Domingues is busy. Aside from being a full time cello teacher, and aside from being the go-to cellist for local musicians (having played on records by Fugazi, Bob Mould, Ted Leo, Jenny Toomey, and Benjy Ferree, among many others), Amy also has her own band, Garland of Hours. The band is a shifting cast of characters; past players include Brendan Canty, Devin Ocampo, Jerry Busher and Mary Timony, and pretty much any of......

The kitchen's closing, and it's last call. In less than one week, I leave my native Washington, D.C. for the San Francisco Bay Area. For someone who loves food and drink, the move means fabulous produce (some, ideally, from the fruit trees in my future backyard), proximity to wine country, wonderful restaurants, and burritos, burritos, burritos! But it also means leaving family, friends, and food memories here in the District. So before I skedaddle, I'm......

Written by DCist fashion contributor Rachel Cothran. Find more of her writing at her web site Project Beltway. Mauro Farinelli's favorite word is ass. "Your ass looks hot," he tells me, pronouncing it the same way you'd say "ouch" after stepping on something sharp. "You have a great ass," he determines matter-of-factly. And what Farinelli says, goes. The thirtysomething owner of local jeans mecca Denim Bar has a magnetic personality and the certain know-it-all attitude......

The man with the coolest name in contemporary rock music drew the largest crowd we’ve ever seen at the Rock and Roll Hotel last night. Keep in mind that it was a Wednesday. John Vanderslice also completely demolished the "fourth wall" between the audience and the stage, handing out Mrs. Field’s cookies, inviting a gaggle of fans to the stage for a sing-along of "me and my 424," and descending from the stage to play......

When they take the stage, it’s apparent that The Ambitions have their style component down pat. Gracefully walking that line between clever and costume, their 60s inspired threads give a naturally polished look. After a few songs it’s clear that the word "polished" extends to their sound, as well. It is impossible to listen to The Ambitions and stand still. This was the case at the band’s recent Black Cat show. An initially austere and......

Steadfast friendships, a taste for whiskey, and a penchant for Iron Maiden and Fugazi. These are the driving forces behind New Rock Church of Fire. The band is made up of bassist Mitchell West – who works with political advertising by day and brews his own beer (Mitchale) by night, guitarist and lead vocalist Floyd York – who pays the bills with a slew of odd jobs from catering to real estate photography, and drummer......

When legislation granting the District a voting seat in the House of Representatives came before the House Judiciary Committee last Thursday, all but two Republicans voted against it. One, Rep. Chris Cannon (R-Ut.), would see his state gain an additional seat, so his support was a given. The second, Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.), was the surprise. Pence has always been a conservative's conservative, a former leader of the Republican Study Committee (a conservative caucus within......

Our good friends at Pitchfork, who we all know you love to hate and hate to love, have a new weekly feature running in which they ask artists what music/movies/books/flavor of ice cream they’re really digging lately. Yesterday’s subject? D.C.’s favorite son (even if he did abandon us for Jersey), Ted Leo. It’s no secret Leo loves D.C. as much as we love him. Many of his early days were spent here, first with Chisel......

Former DCist contributor Jeff Simmermon has a fascinating couple of posts (warning: photos of dead animals in that link) over at And I Am Not Lying for Real (hat tip: Free Ride) about an apparent feud between two Santeria practitioners in the Mt. Pleasant/Adams Morgan area. Those dirty white doves lying by the curb alongside three little samurai hats made of coconut, their car-flattened heads some distance away -- they're not just some sick coincidence,......

As our Gothamist friends picked up back in 2005, 28-year-old comedienne Jennifer Dziura is a pretty funny gal. After reading her bio, I quickly realized that I wanted to be her. The Dartmouth philosophy grad is a human smorgasbord, with past stints as a contraceptive tester, naked model for miscellaneous art schools, trapeze assistant, dot-com entrepreneur, and occasional comedy writer for McSweeney's and the Idiot's Guide to Jokes. Every Monday she emcees Williamsburg’s “Spelling Bee"......

The XYZ Affair will be at the Black Cat Backstage Sunday night. With the Teeth and the High Strung. $10. Is the XYZ Affair’s first proper full-length, A Few More Published Studies, a concept album about academia? If so, it’s anything but bookish. Give the band points for originality -- quoting F. Scott Fitzgerald and echoing Queen isn’t exactly a natural combination -- but give them more points for ambition, because this album is a......

I'm a Black-Cat-or-smaller, low-spectacle rock band kind of Girl. Venturing to the Verizon Center to see a pop sensation perform to thousands of fans last Friday definitely took me out of my element. But bring together I don't know how many dancers, four drum kits, three keytars, two turntables and one man by the name of Timberlake on an unbelievably tricked-out stage in the middle of the floor and, well, I can find plenty......

>> Is Smith Point Burning? If only Billy Frick were still around to ask the question. [Wonkette] >> Regular Flickr contributor techne has a problem with a new Breast Cancer awareness campaign ad, pictured right. Her words: "I strongly object to this ad. To put this extremely violent message on a young woman's headless torso sends an implicit message condoning violence towards women. I very much doubt that you intended to use the imagery of......